Alan Bennett: Plays, Volume 2

by Alan Bennett

  Linda sits down and crosses her legs.

  I say, that’s good.

  Linda What?

  Kafka The way you took one of your legs and just flung it over the other. You’ve done it again. Perfect.

  Linda Don’t be silly. Everybody can do that.

  Kafka No.

  Linda I just don’t think about it.

  Kafka But in order not to think about it one has to give it a good deal of thought.

  Linda tries again and muffs it.

  Linda It’s a simple thing. Like walking.

  Kafka Is walking simple? Stand up.

  Linda stands up.

  You are going to cross the room. For a start you must decide which leg you’re going to move first. Have you come to a decision? Wait. Remember when you’re moving whichever leg it is you’ve decided to move first you should meanwhile be thinking about the one you’re going to move after that. Slowly. Oh, you’ve chosen that leg. I see. Now the other leg. Now the first leg. Now the same leg as you used the time before last. And now this one again, which is the one you used the time before that.

  Linda starts to laugh and stagger and, pealing with laughter, falls into Kafka’s arms.

  At which point Brod and Sydney enter.

  Sydney Linda.

  Linda He was just teaching me how to walk.

  Sydney Oh. I thought you’d just about got that licked.

  Brod Can I help?

  Linda Don’t touch me.

  Brod It’s always the same. As soon as they meet him it’s good-night Max.

  Linda How slim you are.

  Kafka I know. Forgive me.

  Sydney Odd when one remembers what a big man your father was.

  Kafka A giant … how did you know that?

  Sydney Er, he told me. Didn’t you?

  Brod Did I? Of course I did. ‘What a big man his father was’, I remember saying. This isn’t a game.

  Sydney I thought you said it was.

  Brod What about her? She won’t give us away.

  Sydney No. She’s not an intellectual. This is just an ex- nurse. Say Heidegger to her and she thinks it’s a lager.

  Linda Sydney has a father too.

  Kafka It’s not uncommon.

  Linda Only he doesn’t pick his ears with a toothpick.

  Kafka My father used to do that.

  Linda I know.

  Kafka How?

  Sydney I told her.

  Brod And I told him.

  Kafka You say this Proust is well thought of?

  Brod Not by me. It’s a sick mind.

  Linda He liked boys.

  Kafka (shocked) Boys?

  Linda I know. Some men do. Wittgenstein did. Whoever he was.

  Brod Not an intellectual? This is Susan Sontag! What does it matter? Nobody blames them. They’re dead. Death does that for writers. ‘Death is to the individual like Saturday evening is to the chimneysweep: it washes the dirt from his body.’

  Kafka That’s not bad, Max. I’d like to have said that.

  Brod You did, Kafka, you did. It was one of the things I burnt.

  Kafka I was better than I thought.

  Brod You were.

  Kafka What a pity.

  Sydney (nudging Brod) Go on. Now.

  Brod There’s something I have to tell you.

  Sydney I can’t wait for this.

  Linda What?

  Brod It’s about burning your books.

  Sydney Here it comes.

  Kafka No need to tell me, old friend. I know.

  Brod You know?

  Kafka I know.

  Brod (to Sydney) He knows.

  Sydney (to Linda) He knows.

  Linda Knows what?

  Brod And … you don’t blame me?

  Kafka Why should I blame you? How could I?

  Brod Will you listen to this man. Did I say a saint? Shake hands with a saint. He knows.

  Linda What do you know?

  Kafka Once upon a time I asked my friend here to destroy all my writings. I know that he feels bad because he obeyed me.

  Brod He doesn’t know.

  Kafka Don’t worry. I sometimes feel the same. But what’s done is done.

  Brod I’m going to have to try a different tack.

  Sydney You are.

  Linda Sydney …

  Sydney Be quiet.

  Brod Old friend, from that distinguished bundle which I so dutifully thrust into the incinerator I’d like to recall a particularly choice example of what perished that day: ‘Somebody must have been telling lies about Joseph Κ –’

  Brod and Kafka (together) ‘– because one fine morning he woke up and found himself under arrest.’

  Kafka I remember. Two mysterious men arrive to arrest Joseph Κ who doesn’t know what offence he has committed. Then he has to appear before a tribunal somewhere.

  Brod And to get to the courtroom he has to go through somebody’s kitchen –

  Linda Really? (She glances round her kitchen.)

  Kafka – where people just seemed to take him for granted. He never does find out what he’s done.

  Brod And in the end he’s executed.

  Kafka Did I ever give that one a title?

  Brod A great title: The Trial by Franz Kafka.

  Kafka That doesn’t make it sound like a detective story?

  Sydney The public like detective stories.

  Brod Only what have we got instead? A short story about a guy who wakes up as a cockroach.

  Kafka A beetle, Max. A beetle. Why can you never get it right?

  Brod Listen, for all the good you would have done for yourself he could have woken up a fucking centipede.

  Kafka Max!

  Linda One more off-colour remark and he’ll have to leave, won’t he, Sydney? Won’t he?

  father has entered in his overcoat with a little attaché case. He is carrying the orange Penguin book he took in the beginning. He catches Linda’s last phrase and assumes it was meant for him.

  Father Leave? Well, I’m ready. Somebody’s been telling lies about me. They’ve come to take me away and I don’t know what I’ve done.

  Sydney Sit down, Father.

  Linda I’ll get him a tablet. Father thinks we’re going to put him in a home.

  Kafka And are you?

  Linda We didn’t want to. But he’s driven us so mad asking when, we decided in the end we’d better.

  Kafka I sympathize. I hated my father. I once wrote him a letter telling him so. Why one can’t just get rid of parents I don’t understand. One puts the cat out when it’s a nuisance. Why not them?

  Sydney Your father was different.

  Kafka How do you know?

  Brod How many more times? Because I told him.

  Brod exits to the garden. Linda exits for a tablet.

  Sydney Listen, Father. They won’t take you away if you can answer some simple questions. The day of the week.

  Father Yes. I’ve got that off by heart.

  Sydney The name of the Prime Minister.

  Father Yes.

  Sydney And some simple sums. Hang on to those and you’ll be all right.

  Kafka In youth we take examinations to get into institutions. In old age to keep out of them.

  Father (putting the Penguin down) You said this was a detective. It’s not a detective at all.

  Linda returns with the tablet.

  Linda There are no detectives.

  Sydney assists Linda as she takes Father out.

  You have a beautiful Portuguese rug in your room. I can’t think why you want to keep coming down here.

  Kafka is alone on the stage. He picks up the Penguin and looks at it idly. Then less idly.

  Kafka (reading aloud the first sentence) ‘Somebody must have been telling lies about Joseph Κ because one fine morning he was arrested …’ (He turns the book over to look at the title. There is a moment of shocked silence, then shouting) MAX!

  Nobody comes.

  Kafka rushes off and comes b
ack with some of the books taken off the bookshelf.

  (looking at them and throwing them down as he comes) Kafka! Kafka! Kafka! Novels, stories, letters.

  Brod creeps on.

  Brod (faintly) Sorry.

  Kafka Sorry? SORRY? Max. You publish everything I ever wrote and you’re sorry! I trusted you.

  Brod You exaggerated. You always did.

  Kafka So, I say burn them, what do you think I mean, warm them?

  Brod I thought it was just false modesty.

  Kafka All modesty is false, otherwise it’s not modesty. There must be every word here that I’ve ever written.

  Linda comes in.

  Linda What did he do?

  Kafka It’s not what he did. (Indicating the books) It’s what he didn’t do. This is what he did.

  Sydney comes in with a further pile of books.

  Did I write these too? Oh my God!

  Sydney No. These are some of the books about you. Only a few. I believe the Library of Congress catalogue lists some fifteen thousand.

  Kafka Max. What have you done to me?

  Brod Ask not what I’ve done to you, but what you’ve done for humanity. You, who never knew you were a great man, now rank with Flaubert, Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, called fellow by the greatest names in literature. As Shakespeare spoke for mankind on the threshold of the modern world you speak mankind’s farewell in the authentic voice of the twentieth century.

  Kafka (in a small, awe-stricken voice) Shit.

  Sydney He’s taking it very badly.

  Brod Don’t worry. He’ll be all over me in a minute. But who else would treat fame like this, eh? Chekhov? He’d be round to the estate agents, looking at a little place in the country with paddock and mature fruit trees attached. Zola would be installing a Jacuzzi. Even T. S. Eliot’d have people round for drinks. But what does Kafka do?

  Sydney Finds the whole thing a trial.

  Brod Exactly. The humility of the man. I tell you, if I were Jesus Christ I’d be looking over my shoulder.

  Kafka Judas!

  Sydney He’s made you one of the biggest names in twentieth-century literature.

  Linda Even I’ve heard of you.

  Kafka (with exaggerated patience) I didn’t want a big name. I wanted a small name. I shrank my name. I pared it down to nothing. I’d have been happy with no name at all.

  Sydney But that’s the secret of your success. You’ve got a name for anonymity. The Trial: a nameless man’s search for justice in a faceless bureaucracy. When Eastern Europe went communist this was the book that told you about it before it happened. In so many words …

  Kafka That’s it. That’s it. So many words. I’ve added so many words to the world I’ve made it heavier.

  Brod Some day you’ll thank me.

  Kafka Max, this is some day.

  Brod is going to speak.

  I don’t want to speak to you. If you want to talk to somebody talk to Kafka.

  Sydney But you are Kafka.

  Kafka No, I’m not. Kafka is a vast building; a ramshackle institution in every room and department of which, in every corridor, attic and cellar, students and scholars pore over my text and worry over my work. That isn’t me. That is Kafka. Communicate with that. Preferably in triplicate.

  Sydney This piece I’m writing about you for the Journal of Insurance Studies …

  Kafka Don’t talk to me about it. He’s the expert.

  Sydney No, but …

  Kafka Please.

  An awkward silence in which Brod and Sydney are at one side of the stage, Kafka and Linda at the other.

  Linda When did you first get the writing bug then?

  Kafka I’d rather not talk about it.

  Linda I have to confess, I’ve never read a word you’ve written.

  Kafka Good.

  Sydney Wouldn’t understand it if she did.

  Linda I might. How would you know? You never talk to me. I know tons of things about literature.

  Sydney Such as?

  Linda I know about Scott Fitzgerald for a start.

  Kafka What about Scott Fitzgerald?

  Linda He had a small p… Nothing.

  She smiles. Kafka smiles back. She crosses her legs.

  Who’s a clever girl then? (Peal of laughter.)

  Sydney He seems to like her.

  Brod You mean she seems to like him. They always did. He has that kind of social ineptitude women mistake for sincerity.

  Another peal of laughter.

  Sydney Linda. You’re making a fool of yourself.

  Linda No, I’m not. He’s nice. You said he was nice. He is nice.

  Brod Listen, you can do better than her. That’s what fame means. Walk down the street and you’ll be mobbed by autograph hunters, girls ready to do anything, anything just for your signature.

  Kafka But what do I sign? My name. I hate my name. Fame is my name everywhere.

  Brod That’s right. Even on T-shirts. Worn by girls. Girls with no morals and degrees in European Literature. Girls who can mix Jane Austen with the latest developments in foreplay.

  Linda How does he know?

  Brod Because, sister, I’m famous too.

  Kafka You? What for? Not your novels? They were terrible.

  Sydney (indicates the books) For these. As you’re famous so is he. His name is synonymous with yours.

  Kafka How? I’m not even synonymous with my own name.

  Brod The ingratitude!

  Linda I understand.

  Sydney She doesn’t.

  Linda I wish I could make you happy.

  Kafka There’s only one thing that could make me happy. It’s the look on my father’s face.

  Linda Pride?

  Kafka Disgust. ‘Look at this lot, Dad, I showed you.’

  Brod You want to be careful. He might turn up.

  Kafka is instantly alarmed.

  Kafka How could he?

  Linda You turned up.

  Kafka I’m famous. I exist.

  Sydney Your father’s famous.

  Kafka My father? My father ran a fancy goods store.

  Sydney You were a minor civil servant.

  Kafka My father was a bully. He made my life a misery. I blame him for everything.

  Brod So. Why do you think he’s famous?

  Kafka No. Tell me it’s not true. He’s buried and forgotten.

  There is a ring at the bell.

  No. Max, what do I do? Hide me. Help me.

  Linda answers the door.

  Linda (off) I’d forgotten I’d called you.

  Linda enters.

  Don’t be silly. It’s not your father at all. It’s a policeman.

  The Policeman, a burly figure in a raincoat, is also Kafka’s father, Hermann K. He enters and surveys the company without comment, then circles the room to stand behind Kafka.

  Policeman/Hermann Κ Hello, my son.

  Kafka confronts his father as –

  – the Curtain falls.

  Act Two

  Kafka is alone on the stage, his novels and all the books about him in a pile in front of him. Very nervously, and with many precautions lest he be seen doing so he takes up one of the books. Before he can open it –

  Linda enters, carrying two plates of food.

  Kafka hurriedly puts the book back.

  Linda (showing Kafka one of the plates) I’ve done you a hamburger.

  Sydney enters R.

  Sydney He won’t want that.

  Linda Why?

  Sydney He doesn’t like meat.

  Linda How do you know?

  Sydney It’s a matter of historical record.

  Sydney exits L.

  Linda (to Kafka, showing him another plate, on which is a piece of quiche) Try this instead.

  Kafka What’s that?

  Linda It’s something unexpected I do with avocadoes. Tuck in.

  Linda exits R.

  Sydney enters L.

  Sydney I imagine avocados must have been pretty thi
n on the ground in turn of the century Prague.

  Kafka What do they taste like?

  Sydney Soap.

  Sydney exits R.

  Kafka looks at the plate with intense suspicion and puts it down. He starts to sneak another look at one of his books but is again interrupted, this time by Father.

  Father enters.

  Father This is him. He’s got authority written all over him.

  Kafka I want to ask you a question.

  Father Here it comes.

  Kafka Have you ever heard of someone called Kafka?

  Father (who has been about to answer, finds himself baffled) Er …

  Kafka It’s supposed to be a household name.

  Father You don’t want the Prime Minister?

  Kafka He was a Czech novelist. He died in 1924.

  Father Six fours are twenty-four.

  Kafka shakes his head.

  I know the Prime Minister. I know the date and I can manage on the toilet with the bare minimum of assistance but if you’re supposed to know the name of Czech novelists everybody’s going to end up in a home. I had fifteen men under me.

  Father exits.

  Kafka examines the quiche suspiciously. Smells it. Holds it up to the light. Looks for somewhere to hide it. Behind a cushion? In a vase? Finally, hearing someone coming, he makes a dash for the bookcase and slips it in there.

  Linda enters with a glass of milk, a napkin and a box of Black Magic chocolates. She spots the empty plate.

  Linda I knew you’d enjoy that.

  Kafka A novel experience. (He checks the shelf) I put it somewhere between Dostoevsky and Henry James.

  Linda You know how to flatter a girl. Something else? A chocolate perhaps? I have a box of Black Magic I keep for emergencies.

  Kafka shakes his head.

  Linda Your father ate the hamburger.

  Kafka He would.

  Linda I was hoping he’d do that trick of rummaging in his ears with a toothpick then using it to pick his teeth.

  Kafka And did he?

  Linda No. He has dentures now anyway.

  Kafka That’s an improvement.

  Linda He thinks so. He passed them round for inspection.

  Kafka groans.

  Kafka And he used to lecture me about my eating!

  Linda The cheek. You’re twice the man he is. Your constipation is in text books. (Pause.) You’ve never had a stab at marriage then?

  Kafka How could I? I was on such bad terms with my own body there was no room for a third party. You should see me in a bathing costume.

  Linda It could be arranged.

  Kafka It wasn’t that I didn’t like women. In fact I frequently got engaged to them. My fiancées tended to regard me as a species of invertebrate. Marriage was going to give me backbone.